News Release Number: STScI-2013-45

Hubble Reveals First Scrapbook Pictures of Milky Way's Formative Years

November 14, 2013: According to new Hubble Space Telescope observations of our Milky
Way's siblings, which existed long ago, the night sky must have looked
much emptier in the distant past, when our galaxy was still under
construction. The vast majority of our Milky Way's stars had not yet been
born. Yet the heavens were ablaze with a firestorm of new star formation.

By tracing the Milky Way's siblings, astronomers find that our galaxy built
up most of its stars between 11 billion and 7 billion years ago. The
Hubble telescope's superb resolving power allowed the researchers to
study how the structure of Milky Way-like galaxies changed over time. The
observations suggest that our galaxy's flat disk and central bulge grew
simultaneously into the majestic spiral galaxy of today.